


Elysian

by Cloud_Nimbus



Category: Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Fluff, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, No Beta we die like Alduin, POV First Person, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-27
Updated: 2021-01-27
Packaged: 2021-03-13 00:54:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 809
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29020020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cloud_Nimbus/pseuds/Cloud_Nimbus
Summary: Reader expresses feelings with poetryOR“This is sweet and all but I’m human as ever. All clean. The world is alive, and so am I.”Her comment made me smile but did nothing to help me relax. I don’t think anything could at this point, not when my hands are starting to feel clammy and it’s taking all my willpower to keep from stuttering or loosing nerve.
Relationships: Serana (Elder Scrolls)/Reader
Kudos: 1





	Elysian

**Author's Note:**

> Elysian – relating to or having characteristic of heaven or paradise
> 
> Feedback always appreciated. I hope you enjoy this, thanks for reading.

“Shall I compare thee to a Sun’s Height day?  
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.”

Serana is beautiful, not just because there is something magical about the way light catches in her eyes or because her smile turns me into simpering fool. There’s beauty in the way she walks - head held high as if she could carry the world on her shoulders and never falter in her steps – and in her speech. I would dare to say that even her imperfections are beautiful like the way she meticulously adjusts her hair, in hopes that nobody will ever see a single strand out of place and think her as anything less than perfect… or her version of perfect with the standards nobility that I could never meet.

“Winds do shake the darling buds of Mid-Year,   
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.”

And so, rendered an idiot once more by her beauty, I find myself standing before her and reciting terrible poetry so that she might be graced with her attention a little longer.  
“I… what’s with all this all of a sudden?”   
Of course, she has no idea what I am on about and I cannot blame her for that. There’s no way for her to know that I’ve spent the better part of a fortnight working on this and then practicing reciting it, over and over, in the river’s reflection of myself. Other than being the more beautiful one between the two of us, she is definitely the more practical one. Another thing I adore about her.

“Sometimes too hot the eye of Sovngarde shines,  
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;  
And every fair from fair sometime declines,  
By chance, or nature’s changing course, untrimmed.”

I’m not sure when I started to want something more with her. We’d been friends for a while and then one morning I woke up and realised that I couldn’t exist in world without her. There wasn’t any tragic event the day before (which it itself was surprising as no dragon nearly killed us and we hadn’t been set upon trolls or bears or wolves) and she hadn’t done anything different (in fact, she’d been wearing the same clothing as usual and she wasn’t even facing me) but I saw her, standing over a cooking pot and humming to herself, and my voice got stuck my throat and I felt as if I spelled had been cast to enthral me. Maybe it was the domesticity of the scene, but I’ll never know for certain. All I can say in that moment she went from my best friend to the person I wanted to spend my life with. 

“But thy eternal summer shall not fade,  
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’s,  
Nor shall Arkay brag thou wand’rest in his shade,  
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st”

“This is sweet and all but I’m human as ever. All clean. The world is alive, and so am I.”  
Her comment made me smile but did nothing to help me relax. I don’t think anything could at this point, not when my hands are starting to feel clammy and it’s taking all my willpower to keep from stuttering or loosing nerve. I’ve come too far in to back out now. No, I would see this ridiculous idea of mine through to the end and live with whatever came out of it. At least I could say I tried than, even if I only succeed at making a bigger fool of myself.

“So long as mer can breathe, or eyes can see…”

It was almost a relief to sink onto one knee as it meant I no longer had to fear that my legs would shake or give out beneath me. No, now I only had to try and keep my hands steady as I carefully pulled the Amulet of Mara out of my shirt and stared up at her with the most convincing eyes I could muster.

“So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.”

She simply stood there, and I felt my heart clog up my throat. My eyes burned from the tears I wouldn’t shed in front of her as I tried to figure out how I could salvage this situation and not lose my best friend over a stupid I never asked for in the first place. “You’re an idiot.” She said, and as always, she was right. Maybe I should have first tried to figure out if there was even a chance that she would return my feelings, maybe this would teach me to stop jumping headfirst into trouble, maybe I would-  
And then she kissed me and all those maybes and should have, could have, would have in another lifetime evaporated. “Yeah… but I’m your idiot.”

Inspires by Sonnet 18; William Shakespeare


End file.
